Rana Muhammad Atif

Summary

My research work broadly concentrates on the genetic improvement of grain legumes against abiotic stresses using genetic and genomic approaches. More specifically, my lab characterizes cool-season pulse legumes germplasm especially chickpea and lentil for the identification of best performing elite genotypes. For this purpose, we are employing genetics, genomics and conventional breeding approaches. At genome level, we are involved in identification and characterization of key transcriptional factor family members from the sequenced genomes of grain legumes implicated in the abiotic stress responses. We also employ comparative phylogenetic approaches to get insights in the evolution of these gene families in crop plants. Using the genotyping-by-sequencing approach, we are also identifying the key genomic regions controlling the important agronomic and physiological traits under abiotic stresses using genome-wide association studies in Chickpea. We are trying to identify the key alleles and their gene expression under drought-stress conditions in Chickpea using RNA-seq based transcriptional profiling.

Agricultural Science Bioinformatics Biotechnology Genomics Molecular Biology Plant Science

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